Zara is responsible for driving Lendi’s strategic marketing as it continues to experience rapid growth. Joining as CMO in September 2018, Zara is responsible for driving growth in customer acquisition, finding optimisations in the customer journey and ultimately, helping shape Lendi into a household name.

Zara has 12 years of local and global media and marketing experience across financial, FMCG and eCommerce sectors. She has held a number of senior roles in media agencies including MediaCom, Match Media, and more recently, Blue 449, where she led the strategic and analytics product.

Todd Hewitt is the General Manager – Commercial and Digital Strategy for the NRL and works with brands to connect with Rugby League fans and to develop effective marketing solutions. As a leader within the Commercial and Marketing division, Hewitt is responsible for driving ROI for current partners, developing new corporate partnerships, growing digital revenue and managing inventory and yield.

Prior to the NRL, he worked for five years as senior marketing consultant for the Gemba Group, working across brands and sports organisations including Toyota, IAG, Coca-Cola, Sanitarium, ANZ, Foxtel, the AFL and Cricket Australia.

His experience includes digital and brand strategy, partnership planning, buying and negotiating, leverage execution and partnership evaluation. Hewitt has also undertaken a number of commercial strategies for rights holders including Sport New Zealand and Cricket Australia.

Ali Keller is the national partnerships manager at Alinta Energy, a fast-growing energy company with one million combined electricity and gas projects. Ali is spearheading Alinta Energy’s  principal partnership with Cricket Australia – the company’s first-ever national sponsorship, and one of Australian sport’s largest deals.

Ali has extensive brand-side experience, having held senior sponsorship roles at Vodafone, Westpac and St George Banking Group prior to joining Alinta Energy. She has overseen the sponsorship programs of many of Australia’s largest brands, having also managed sponsorship portfolios for Qantas, HSBC and Ford as sponsorship account director at sponsorship agency Subnine.

Ms Geraldine Davys is an experienced marketing executive with experience across domestic and global markets. Her expertise is in strategic planning, digital innovation, marketing and leadership across a number of industry sectors including digital and technology, marketing and communications, auto, property and financial services.

Her role is currently Exec Director of Marketing & Product of Nissan, but prior roles have included CMO & Chief Customer Experience Officer of iSelect, Executive Director of Marketing, Product & Customer Experience of General Motors Holden (GMH), GM Brand & Communications at Sensis (Telstra Digital Media) as well as roles across Westpac as Associate Director, Marketing (in their Institutional Bank), Accenture & Lend Lease.

Ms Davys also has a Bachelor of Business (Marketing with Honours) from Monash University, and an MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM), University of NSW.

Andrew Stark is the General Manager World Surf League and Kelly Slater Wave Co Australia and Oceania. Andrew joined WSL in September 2018 after serving as CEO for Surfing Australia for 9 ½ years, where he successfully grew that business commercially and started the now thriving Surfing Australia High Performance Centre (HPC) which is based at Casuarina Beach, Northern New South Wales.

Andrew has a Bachelor of Business Management degree from the Queensland University of Technology and has over 20 years’ experience in sport management and the surfing industry.

Andrew is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (2014), in 2016 Andrew completed the Harvard Business School Authentic Leadership Development Program in Boston, and in August 2018 he attended Stanford University in USA to complete a Strategic Marketing and Innovation Executive Program.

Andrew is a passionate and experienced surfer who thoroughly enjoys the ocean and everything the sport and lifestyle of surfing has to offer. He is a sports enthusiast and family man.

Anna Burgdorf joined Flight Centre Travel Group in January 2019 as General Manager of Product & Marketing for the company’s Premium Brand Group.

Responsible for marketing, communications and product for both the Travel Associates and Travel Partners brands, Burgdorf is charged with elevating the premium brand credentials of both businesses and with establishing a sponsorship and event strategy to drive acquisition and build client loyalty.

Prior to this, Burgdorf spent 21 years with German luxury automotive manufacturer, Audi Australia Pty Ltd, most recently as Director of Marketing & Communications.

During her time at Audi, she was responsible for building the company’s robust Sponsorship and Events portfolio, including some of Audi’s most successful partnerships like the 12 year Audi Hamilton Island Race Week and Sydney Theatre Company partnerships, as well as the decade-long Audi and InStyle Women of Style awards. Burgdorf was also responsible for establishing the company’s Ambassador program in 1997.

She remains a founding Board Member of the Audi Foundation Australia and is an advocate for gender equality in the workplace.

Leigh Brezler is the Director of Partnerships for the Australian Chamber Orchestra. She has over 15 years’ experience in the Arts and Sport sponsorship space, having worked for the Sydney Film Festival, Sydney Opera House and most recently for Cricket Australia.

Adrian is a partner in the Creative, Brand & Media business at Deloitte. The business is structured to supercharge creative problem solving capabilities across the entire firm while also directly managing clients creative requirements.

Adrian’s creative work has been recognised over 700 times at global and local award shows, including 60 Cannes Lions. He has also been a jury member Cannes, New York Festivals and for the World Advertising Research Centre.

Prior to Deloitte Adrian was Managing Director of the highly decorated McCann Melbourne, recipient of multiple agency of the year titles at some of the world’s most prestigious creative festivals.

Haylee currently leads the brand and engagement team at Bankwest, responsible for all elements of brand strategy, brand communications, sponsorship and social engagement.  Haylee has a diverse background of strategic marketing experience from a long career including both agency and client-side marketing. Haylee's greatest passion is uncovering value adding consumer insights for brands, and ensuring all strategic decisions and creative solutions are insight driven. 

Haylee enjoys the management of key delivery partners to ensure diverse and collaborative problem solving that directly influences commercial outcomes. Haylee's previous experience includes many well-known brands within both the Perth market (through clients of The Brand Agency), in the retail utility sector in the UK (British Gas), as well as working within a-number of well-known creative, marketing and CSR agencies in the UK providing a breadth of experience in solving unique business problems. 

Haylee loves to develop high performing teams who feel empowered to challenge the status quo and can demonstrate the value of marketing investment and brand building back to the business. In her free time Haylee likes cooking and spending time with her children and husband - preferably in warm sunshine and near the beach.

With over 20 years of Marketing experience in Australia, Stuart’s experience ranges from managing large multinational brands to establishing and running his own small businesses. With extensive experience in the beer & alcohol category, sponsorship has always played a key role – from both large high-profile properties, and increasingly small grass-roots events.

After working on Benson & Hedges, he moved across to the beer category in 1998 as marketing opportunities evaporated, and led the launch and brand management of some of the most iconic brands in the industry – including one brand development & launch which to-date has sold in excess of $3 billion at retail level. After a stint in NPD and National Sales, he took the plunge and left to explore opportunities outside corporate world, including starting a brand building consultancy, as well as the establishment of a highly successful craft microbrewery which engaged over 20,000 customers in the infancy years of this dynamic segment.

The business was sold in 2013 and after a 2-year stint working in the natural health industry, found his place at Coca Cola Amatil, helping to build brand led growth in the beer, cider and rum categories.

A passionate brand builder, always looking to challenge the norm.

Patrick Kidd was appointed as the CEO of the Invictus Games Sydney 2018 in January 2017 and is on secondment from Deloitte until the Games conclude in October 2018.

Patrick has been with Deloitte since the start of 2015 having joined after a 30-year career in the British and Australian defence forces. He has extensive experience leading teams to deliver highly complex programmes involving many different nations and multiple stakeholders. He has had operational service across the Balkans, Middle east and Afghanistan where he has worked in partnership with the Armed forces from many different nations and in Afghanistan he was responsible for the force development of the local police and National Army forces.

He holds an MBA (Open University) and is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Jason Fielding is the Senior Vice President and Managing Director of Endeavor Global Marketing in Australia, the cultural marketing agency within the Endeavor network which includes leading talent agency WME and sports and fashion industry pioneer IMG. Endeavor Global Marketing is now nearly 800 employees strong globally, providing expertise in brand strategy and activation, digital marketing, public relations, sponsorship, influencer strategy, original content and business intelligence to major brand clients.

Prior to leading Endeavor Global Marketing’s leading experiential team, IMG LIVE in Australia, Jason founded an agency called The Sound Campaign which operated successfully for over ten years and became Australia’s leading independent music and culture agency. The Sound campaign joined forces with Endeavor Global Marketing in 2017 to expand the cultural agency’s business offerings and capabilities in the APAC region.

Francis Coady joined Havas in February 2016 as General Manager to launch Havas Sports & Entertainment (HSE). The division has built out a team of experts across data and consumer insights, strategy, sponsorship & partnership management, content, live activations and measurement. In just over two years HSE has won large scale client work with the likes of Bupa, LG, Moet & Chandon, Gillette (P&G), Mentos, NRMA, CGU, NSW Government and Red Bull. Havas Sports & Entertainment mantra is intelligent partnerships, straight talk! 

Coady secured his Master of Arts from UTS in 2002 and spent 13+ years as GM of The Coady Group, a boutique six-person agency in the management of music, film, sport and live activations. Having overseen the management of seminal Australian Rock Group Thirsty Merc, he negotiated the global signing to Warner Music, executed global touring campaigns to more than 750,000 people over 1,000 live shows, and facilitated the sale of in excess of 300,000 albums, securing four ARIA nominations and two Top 3 platinum albums along with major brand partnerships with the NRL, AFL and Channel Ten and Coca-Cola through the Holiday House give-away campaign. Francis secured rights deals, for his client Hi-5 (global children’s group), with Channel Ten, Nickelodeon and Live Nation, along with managing major brand partnerships and activations with brands such as Yakult, Apple, Vodafone, Telstra, St George Bank, Cartier and Macquarie Bank. For 13 years he was the executive producer for the high-end boutique event, the Bondi Short Film Festival managing all sponsorship partnerships with Nova, News Corp, Nokia, Stella Artois, Jamison’s and Showtime to name a few brands. For two years Francis was the GM of Merchantwise, a 28-person agency, where he managed brand partnerships for 20th Century Fox and the FFA (Football Federation of Australia), Optus and Paramount Pictures and ABC Kids commercial division. 

A commercially focussed Senior Analyst at Neuro-Insight with over 7 years’ experience, Casey has been involved with some of Australia's and Asia Pacific’s largest brands and organisations, helping them design, explore, implement and apply unique neuroscience-based insights.

Specialising and publishing in the realm of cognitive drivers of consumer behaviour and decision making, Casey combines her passion and knowledge to understand the various impacts of media, creative, category, and the consumer.

Mark Pejic is an experienced advertising and media executive with experience managing and developing some of the largest ASX listed media agencies across Asia Pacific region.

Current, CEO QMS Sport - QMS Sport continues to expand its sports technology and media rights portfolio, including international expansion into Europe, USA and South America. Further strengthening QMS Sport’ position in key strategic international sports markets as it continues to expand its geographic footprint, and simultaneously diversify revenue channels and deliver further value to its shareholders.

Chainman, IPG Mediabrands - IPG Mediabrands is the global media and data arm of Interpublic Group (NYSE: IPG). Today, the network manages $39 billion in marketing investment on behalf of its clients, employing over 10,000 marketing communication specialists in more than 130 countries. As Chairman for IPG Mediabrands Mark was responsible for the network’s overall performance in the Melbourne market.

CEO, MediaCom - MediaCom is one of the world’s leading media agencies. As part of a global network, they plan and buy media for some of the world’s biggest brands. MediaCom’s network comprises 7,000 employees in 125 offices in 100 countries around the world.

Kate is a consultant, connector and advocate who works with cultural organisations, not-for-profits and social ventures to increase the financial value of culture. Recently she has advised organisations as diverse as TEDxSydney, StartupAUS, The Chaser, The Art Gallery of NSW, The Future Directors Institute, The Architects Institute Foundation, The Victorian Pride Centre, Bundanon Trust, Underbelly Arts and the National Trust on business development, sponsorship and fundraising strategies. 

She is currently a Board Director for Underbelly Arts and National Trust of Australia (NSW) and the coordinator of the NSW Primary Ethics program at her kids school in Berry. Previously she was on the board of Art Month Sydney and the South Coast Tourism Board. 

Endlessly curious, she cares deeply about subjects as diverse as arts, the built environment, digital culture, board diversity, building our regional economies, sustainability, saving the media from itself and social ventures.